Pieter Schoeman
joined the London
Philharmonic Orchestra
as Co-Leader in 2002,
and was appointed
Leader in 2008.

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Born in South Africa,
he made his solo début
aged 10 with the
Cape Town Symphony
Orchestra. He studied with Jack de Wet in South Africa,
winning numerous competitions including the 1984
World Youth Concerto Competition in the US. In 1987
he was offered the Heifetz Chair of Music scholarship
to study with Eduard Schmieder in Los Angeles and
in 1991 his talent was spotted by Pinchas Zukerman,
who recommended that he move to New York to study
with Sylvia Rosenberg. In 1994 he became her teaching
assistant at Indiana University, Bloomington.
Pieter has performed worldwide as a soloist and
recitalist in such famous halls as the Concertgebouw in
Amsterdam, Moscow’s Rachmaninov Hall, Capella Hall in
St Petersburg, Staatsbibliothek in Berlin, Hollywood Bowl
in Los Angeles and Southbank Centre’s Queen Elizabeth
Hall in London. As a chamber musician he regularly
performs at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall.
As a soloist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra,
Pieter has performed Arvo Pärt’s Double Concerto with
Boris Garlitsky, Brahms’s Double Concerto with Kristina
Blaumane, and Britten’s Double Concerto with Alexander
Zemtsov, which was recorded and released on the
Orchestra’s own record label to great critical acclaim.
He has recorded numerous violin solos with the London
Philharmonic Orchestra for Chandos, Opera Rara, Naxos,
X5, the BBC and for American film and television, and led
the Orchestra in its soundtrack recordings for The Lord of
the Rings trilogy.
In 1995 Pieter became Co-Leader of the Orchestre
Philharmonique de Nice. Since then he has performed
frequently as Guest Leader with the symphony orchestras
of Barcelona, Bordeaux, Lyon and Baltimore, as well as
with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
Pieter is a Professor of Violin at Trinity Laban
Conservatoire of Music and Dance.

* Holds a professorial
appointment in London
† Chevalier of the Brazilian
Order of Rio Branco

Wagner Tubas
Mark Vines
Martin Hobbs
Jonathan Bareham
Jonathan Lipton

Chair Supporters
The London Philharmonic Orchestra also acknowledges the following chair supporter whose player is not
present at this concert:
Andrew Davenport
London Philharmonic Orchestra | 3

LONDON PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA

The London Philharmonic Orchestra is one of the
world’s finest orchestras, balancing a long and
distinguished history with a reputation as one of the
UK’s most adventurous and forward-looking orchestras.
As well as performing classical concerts, the Orchestra
also records film and computer game soundtracks,
has its own record label, and reaches thousands of
Londoners every year through activities for schools and
local communities.
The Orchestra was founded by Sir Thomas Beecham
in 1932, and since then has been headed by many of
the great names in the conducting world, including
Sir Adrian Boult, Bernard Haitink, Sir Georg Solti,
Klaus Tennstedt and Kurt Masur. The current Principal
Conductor is Russian Vladimir Jurowski, appointed in
2007, with French-Canadian Yannick Nézet-Séguin as
Principal Guest Conductor.
The Orchestra is based at Royal Festival Hall in
London’s Southbank Centre, where it has performed
since it opened in 1951 and been Resident Orchestra
since 1992. It gives around 40 concerts there each
season with many of the world’s top conductors and
soloists. Concert highlights in 2011/12 include a
three-week festival celebrating the music of Prokofiev,
concerts with artists including Sir Mark Elder, Marin
Alsop, Renée Fleming, Stephen Hough and Joshua Bell,
and several premières of works by living composers
including the Orchestra’s Composer in Residence,
Julian Anderson. In addition to its London concerts,
the Orchestra has flourishing residencies in Brighton
and Eastbourne, and performs regularly around
the UK. Every summer, the Orchestra leaves London
for four months and takes up its annual residency
accompanying the famous Glyndebourne Festival Opera
in the Sussex countryside, where it has been Resident
Symphony Orchestra since 1964.
The London Philharmonic Orchestra tours internationally,
performing to sell-out audiences worldwide. In 1956
it became the first British orchestra to appear in Soviet
Russia and in 1973 made the first-ever visit to China by
a Western orchestra. Touring remains a big part of the
Orchestra’s life: tours in the 2011/12 season include
visits to Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, the US, Spain,
China, Russia, Oman, Brazil and France.

4 | London Philharmonic Orchestra

You may well have heard the London Philharmonic
Orchestra on film soundtrack recordings: it has recorded
many blockbuster scores, from The Lord of the Rings
trilogy to Lawrence of Arabia, The Mission, Philadelphia
and East is East. The Orchestra also broadcasts regularly
on television and radio, and in 2005 established its own
record label. There are now over 60 releases on the label,
which are available on CD and to download. Recent
additions include Dvořák’s Symphonic Variations and
Symphony No. 8 conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras;
Holst’s The Planets conducted by Vladimir Jurowski;
Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 under Klaus Tennstedt;
Shostakovich Piano Concertos with Martin Helmchen
under Vladimir Jurowski; and Sibelius’s Symphony
No. 5, Pohjola’s Daughter and Lutosławski’s Concerto for
Orchestra under Jukka-Pekka Saraste. The Orchestra was
also recently honoured with the commission to record
all 205 of the world’s national anthems for the London
2012 Olympics Team Welcome Ceremonies and Medal
Ceremonies.
To help maintain its high standards and diverse
workload, the Orchestra is committed to the welfare
of its musicians and in December 2007 received the
Association of British Orchestras/Musicians Benevolent
Fund Healthy Orchestra Bronze Charter Mark.
The London Philharmonic Orchestra maintains an
energetic programme of activities for young people and
local communities. Highlights include the ever-popular
family and schools concerts, fusion ensemble The Band,
the Leverhulme Young Composers project and the Foyle
Future Firsts orchestral training scheme for outstanding
young players. Over the last few years, developments
in technology and social networks have enabled the
Orchestra to reach even more people worldwide: all its
recordings are available to download from iTunes and,
as well as a YouTube channel, news blog, iPhone app
and regular podcasts, the Orchestra has a lively Twitter
presence.
Find out more and get involved!
lpo.org.uk
twitter.com/LPOrchestra

At 36 years old, Yannick
Nézet-Séguin is one
of the most highly
respected and soughtafter conductors on
today’s international
classical music
scene and has been
widely praised by
audiences, critics and
artists alike for his
musicianship, dedication and charisma. He is Principal
Guest Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra,
and Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the
Orchestre Métropolitain in Montreal. He is also Music
Director of the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, and
in June 2010 was appointed Music Director Designate
of the Philadelphia Orchestra – he will take up the full
title of Music Director from the 2012/13 season.

and Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette with the Mozarteum
Orchester Salzburg. Summer 2011 saw a revival of
Don Giovanni. He made his début at Teatro alla Scala,
Milan with the festival’s production of Roméo et Juliette
in June 2011.
Highlights of Yannick’s 2011/12 season include
an extensive tour of Germany with the Rotterdam
Philharmonic Orchestra and return visits to the Vienna
Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic and Dresden
Staatskapelle. Opera performances include Faust
with the Metropolitan Opera and Don Carlo at the
Netherlands Opera. He will make his début at the Royal
Opera House, Covent Garden, later this month with
Dvořák’s Rusalka.

A native of Montreal, Yannick has conducted all the
major Canadian orchestras. Since his European début in
2004, he has appeared regularly with many of Europe’s
leading orchestras including the Orchestre National
de France, Dresden Staatskapelle, Royal Stockholm
Philharmonic Orchestra and Chamber Orchestra of
Europe.

Yannick’s first three Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra
recordings on the EMI/Virgin label comprise an Edison
Award-winning album of Ravel’s orchestral works; the
Beethoven and Korngold violin concertos with Renaud
Capuçon; and Fantasy: A Night at the Opera with flautist
Emmanuel Pahud. Recent releases with BIS Records
include discs of Strauss (Ein Heldenleben/Four Last
Songs) and Berlioz (Symphonie fantastique/La mort de
Cléopâtre). His discography also includes several awardwinning recordings with the Orchestre Métropolitain on
the ATMA Classique label.

Yannick made his BBC Proms début in 2009 with the
Scottish Chamber Orchestra and returned the following
year with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. Recent
highlights include highly successful tours of the Far East
and North America with the Rotterdam Philharmonic,
as well as his débuts with the Bavarian Radio Symphony
Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic
(at the 2010 Salzburg Mozartwoche), TonhalleOrchester Zürich, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia,
The Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic
and Boston Symphony Orchestra.

Yannick studied piano, conducting, composition
and chamber music at the Quebec Conservatoire in
Montreal and continued his studies with renowned
conductors, most notably the Italian maestro Carlo
Maria Giulini. His honours include a prestigious Royal
Philharmonic Society Award, the Virginia Parker Prize
from the Canada Council in 2000, numerous Prix Opus
from the Quebec Music Council, and Canada’s highly
coveted National Arts Centre Award. He was awarded
an honorary doctorate by the University of Quebec in
Montreal in 2011.

A notable operatic conductor, Yannick made his critically
acclaimed Metropolitan Opera début in December 2009
with a new production of Bizet’s Carmen and has since
returned for a new production of Verdi’s Don Carlo.
For the Netherlands Opera he has conducted Janáček’s
The Makropulos Case and Puccini’s Turandot with the
Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra. Having made his
début at the Salzburg Festival in 2008, he returned in
2010 for Don Giovanni with the Vienna Philharmonic
London Philharmonic Orchestra | 5

soprano

mezzo soprano

Christine Brewer
was born in Illinois,
USA, and began her
professional career
with the Opera
Theatre of Saint
Louis, with whom
she has performed
Ellen Orford, Donna
Anna and the title
roles in Ariadne auf
Naxos, Haydn’s Armida and Britten’s Gloriana. She has
sung the Countess at New York City Opera and the Royal
Opera, Covent Garden; Donna Anna at the Edinburgh
Festival and in London, New York and Florida; Leonore
in Fidelio in Lisbon and San Francisco; Gluck’s Iphigénie
en Tauride in Madrid; Weber’s Oberon in London; and
Strauss’s Die Ägyptische Helena, Britten’s Peter Grimes
and Gluck’s Alceste in Santa Fe. She sang Isolde with the
BBC Symphony Orchestra and Donald Runnicles, the
Los Angeles Philharmonic and Esa-Pekka Salonen, and
at the Edinburgh Festival with Jonathan Nott; Gloriana
with Richard Hickox at the Aldeburgh Festival; and
Chrysothemis in Elektra with The Cleveland Orchestra
and Franz Welser-Möst. She has sung the Färberin in
Die Frau ohne Schatten in Chicago and at the Paris Opera,
and Ariadne for English National Opera, Opera de Lyon
(Lyon and Paris), Santa Fe and at the Metropolitan Opera
under James Levine.

Mihoko Fujimura
was born in Japan
and studied in Tokyo
and Munich. She
won numerous
international singing
competitions before
joining the ensemble
of the Graz Opera in
1995, where she sang
many of her signature
roles for the first time. She came to international
attention for her performances at the 2002 Munich
Opera Festival and the Bayreuth Festival, and has since
become a regular guest at the Royal Opera House,
Covent Garden; Teatro alla Scala, Milan; Bayerische
Staatsoper; Wiener Staatsoper; Théâtre du Châtelet,
Paris; Teatro Real, Madrid; Deutsche Oper, Berlin;
Bayreuther Festspiele; Maggio Musicale Fiorentino; and
the Aix-en-Provence Festival. In concert she appears
with the world’s leading orchestras and is a regular
guest artist in Japan. She has appeared at the Bayreuth
Festival for nine consecutive seasons.

Christine appears regularly with the major American
and European orchestras under Sir Roger Norrington,
Michael Tilson Thomas, Kurt Masur, Christoph von
Dohnányi, Andrew Litton, Sir Neville Marriner, Wolfgang
Sawallisch, David Robertson and Zubin Mehta. Her
many recordings include Don Giovanni under Sir Charles
Mackerras; Barber’s Vanessa under Leonard Slatkin;
Fidelio and Verdi’s Requiem with Sir Colin Davis; Britten’s
War Requiem with Kurt Masur; Mahler’s 8th Symphony
under Sir Simon Rattle; Strauss’s Four Last Songs with
Donald Runnicles; and Schubert and Strauss recitals.
Christine’s European concert appearances include
the Concertgebouw and Bavarian Radio Symphony
orchestras with Mariss Jansons; the Berlin Philharmonic
Orchestra with Sir Simon Rattle; the BBC Symphony
Orchestra with Jiří Bĕlohlávek; the London Symphony
Orchestra with Sir Colin Davis; and the Accademia
Nazionale di Santa Cecilia with Sir Antonio Pappano.
6 | London Philharmonic Orchestra

Her operatic repertoire includes Kundry, Brangäne,
Venus, Fricka, Idamantes, Octavian, Carmen, Eboli,
Azucena and Amneris. Her concert repertoire includes
Verdi’s Requiem, Wagner’s Wesendonck Lieder and
Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, Rückert-Lieder, Des
Knaben Wunderhorn and Symphonies Nos. 2, 3 and
8. She appears regularly with conductors including
Claudio Abbado, Myung-Whun Chung, Christoph
Eschenbach, Christian Thielemann and Kurt Masur,
and in recital with Christoph Ulrich Meier.
Mihoko has recorded Brangäne (Tristan und Isolde)
with Sir Antonio Pappano for EMI Classics; Gurrelieder
with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and
Mariss Jansons; and Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 with
the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra and Jonathan Nott.
Her first solo recital disc with works by Wagner, Mahler,
Schubert and Strauss has been released by Fontec.
Recent and future engagements include returns to the
opera houses of London, Vienna, Barcelona and Paris. In
concert she appears with the Vienna, Rotterdam, Tokyo
and Munich Philharmonic orchestras; the Bavarian
Radio, Montreal and London symphony orchestras;
the Orchestre de Paris, The Philadelphia Orchestra, the
Accademia Santa Cecilia and the Royal Concertgebouw
Orchestra.

An honours graduate
and choral scholar
from New College,
Oxford, Toby Spence
studied at the
Guildhall School of
Music & Drama.
In concert, he has sung
with the Berlin and
Vienna Philharmonic
orchestras under Sir Simon Rattle; the San Francisco
Symphony Orchestra under Michael Tilson Thomas;
The Cleveland Orchestra under Christoph von Dohnányi;
the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia under
Sir Antonio Pappano; the Rotterdam Philharmonic
Orchestra under Valery Gergiev; the London Symphony
Orchestra under Sir Colin Davis; the Los Angeles
Philharmonic Orchestra under Gustavo Dudamel; and
at the Salzburg and Edinburgh Festivals. His recital
appearances include the Edinburgh Festival, LSO St
Lukes, Opéra de Lille and Wigmore Hall, and he has made
numerous recordings for Deutsche Grammophon, Decca,
BMG, Philips, Collins, Linn Records, Hyperion and EMI.
Roles Toby has sung for English National Opera include
Fenton, Ferrando, Tamino, Candide, Paris (La belle Hélène)
and Faust, and for the Royal Opera, Kudryash, Simpleton
(Boris Godunov), Ferdinand (The Tempest), Count
Almaviva, Ramiro and Tom Rakewell. He has also sung
with Glyndebourne Festival Opera; the Bavarian State
Opera; the Netherlands Opera; the Deutsche Staatsoper
Berlin; the San Francisco Opera; the Santa Fe Festival;
Lyric Opera of Chicago; and the Metropolitan Opera.
This season Toby makes his début with the Vienna State
Opera as Ferrando. He also sings Lensky (Eugene Onegin)
and Vere (Billy Budd) for English National Opera, and
David (Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg) for the Royal
Opera. Future engagements include Tom Rakewell for
the Theater an der Wien; Don Ottavio and Tito for the
Vienna State Opera; Tamino and Tito for the Bavarian
State Opera; and return visits to the Metropolitan
Opera. Concerts this season include the London
Symphony Orchestra under Thomas Adès; the BBC
Symphony Orchestra under Sir Andrew Davis; the City of
Birmingham Symphony Orchestra under Andris Nelsons;
and the Deutsche Oper under Donald Runnicles. He also
gives recitals at Opéra de Lille and the Edinburgh Festival.

In a career spanning
over 20 years,
Franz-Josef Selig has
established himself
as one of the world’s
leading basses.
He studied at the
Staatliche Hochschule
für Musik, Cologne,
before taking lessons
with Claudio Nicolai.
Since then he has appeared at the world’s great opera
houses including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden;
La Scala, Milan; Wiener Staatsoper; Opéra National de
Paris; Metropolitan Opera, New York; Lyric Opera of
Chicago; and Deutsche Oper, Berlin. Conductors with
whom he has performed include Kent Nagano, Sir Simon
Rattle, Sir Antonio Pappano, Helmuth Rilling, Jukka-Pekka
Saraste, Christian Thielemann and Franz Welser-Möst.
Last season included appearances in London (The Magic
Flute under Sir Colin Davis), Vienna (Parsifal under Ingo
Metzmacher), New York (the Ring Cycle under James
Levine), and The Magic Flute and Fidelio in Munich,
before returning to the Salzburg Festival in August 2011.
He began this season as Arkel in Debussy’s Pelléas et
Mélisande under Sylvain Cambreling in Madrid and
Philippe Jordan in Paris. In April he appears at New York’s
Metropolitan Opera in Wagner’s Ring Cycle, and will make
his début at the Bayreuth Festival this summer. He will
also appear with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande
under Marek Janowski in Geneva and Lausanne.
Despite his busy international concert schedule,
Franz-Josef Selig still finds time for recital performances.
Last month he presented Schubert’s Winterreise at the
Beethoven-Haus in Bonn with pianist Gerold Huber. He
also enjoys collaborations with Markus Schäfer, Christian
Elsner and Michael Volle, and in the field of period
music performs regularly with Nikolaus Harnoncourt
and the Concentus Musicus Wien, and with Philippe
Herreweghe, René Jacobs and the Academy for Ancient
Music in Berlin.
Franz-Josef Selig has made numerous recordings
including Bach’s St Matthew Passion, Mozart’s The Magic
Flute, Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro, Weber’s
Abu Hassan, Busoni’s Turandot and Wagner’s Parsifal.
London Philharmonic Orchestra | 7

Founded in 1947, the London Philharmonic Choir
is widely regarded as one of Britain’s finest choirs,
consistently meeting with great critical acclaim. It has
performed under leading international conductors
throughout the last 65 years and made numerous
recordings for CD, radio and television. Its Artistic
Director is Neville Creed.
Enjoying a close relationship with the London
Philharmonic Orchestra, the Choir frequently joins it for
concerts in the UK and abroad. In 2010/11, engagements
included Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 and Das klagende
Lied, Bartók’s The Miraculous Mandarin, Dvořák’s Te Deum
and Stabat Mater, Fauré’s Requiem, Holst’s The Planets
and Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius. This season, concerts
with the LPO have included Scriabin’s Prometheus, Poem
of Fire, Rossini’s Stabat Mater and Prokofiev’s Ivan the
Terrible. Future engagements include Szymanowski’s
Symphony No. 3, Zemlinsky’s Psalm 23, Delius’s Sea Drift
and Suk’s The Ripening.
Recently released CDs with the London Philharmonic
Orchestra include Dvořák’s Requiem conducted by
Neeme Järvi, Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem with
Yannick Nézet-Séguin and Holst’s The Planets, Mahler’s
Symphony No. 2, Haydn’s The Seven Last Words of our
Saviour on the Cross and Honneger’s Une Cantate de Noël
under Vladimir Jurowski.

Appearing regularly at the BBC Proms at the Royal Albert
Hall, the Choir’s performances have included Beethoven’s
Symphony No. 9, Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius,
Rachmaninov’s The Bells and the UK premières of MarkAnthony Turnage’s A Relic of Memory and Goldie’s Sine
Tempore in the Evolution! Prom. The Choir performed at
the Doctor Who Proms in 2008 and 2010, and in 2011
appeared in Verdi’s Requiem, Liszt’s A Faust Symphony
and Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis.
The Choir works with other leading orchestras, has
visited numerous European countries and performed in
Kuala Lumpur, Hong Kong and Perth, Australia. The Choir
will appear at Le Touquet International Music Masters
Festival in France in April 2012. Last May it joined forces
with the London Symphony Chorus to perform Walton’s
Belshazzar’s Feast with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra
under Andrew Litton, and in December sang Messiah
with the Mozart Festival Orchestra under Oliver Gooch.
The Choir also sings in Raymond Gubbay’s Classical
Spectacular and Christmas concerts, and has appeared in
galas with Russell Watson and Katherine Jenkins.
The London Philharmonic Choir prides itself on achieving
first-class performances from its members, who are
volunteers from all walks of life. For more information,
including details about how to join, please visit
www.lpc.org.uk

Speedread
Anton Bruckner was a devout Roman Catholic.
Years of neglect and critical abuse in the Austrian
capital Vienna, along with a tendency to crippling
depression, put that faith to severe test. But as
his fortunes changed and his genius began to be
recognised, Bruckner’s first thought was of giving
thanks to God for sustaining him through his trials.
The magnificent choral-orchestral Te Deum, with its
joyously affirmative ending, was the result. Echoes
of the Te Deum can be also heard in the miniature
masterpiece Christus factus est for unaccompanied

chorus, which begins this concert. Bruckner conceived
his Ninth Symphony as a final offering to his ‘dear
God’, with a finale culminating in a triumphant
‘Hymn of Praise’. When he realised (correctly,
alas) that he might not finish the Ninth, Bruckner
suggested using the Te Deum as a choral finale.
The experiment has rarely been tried, but tonight’s
concert brings the two works together, so that the
final word might be – as Bruckner intended – one of
faith re-affirmed.

Anton Bruckner (1824–96)
Motet: Christus factus est
For the best part of a century, Anton Bruckner’s
reputation rested almost entirely on his symphonies –
those hugely ambitious ‘cathedrals in sound’, which
can still polarize opinion to extremes. But Bruckner
didn’t begin to tackle symphonic form until he was
nearly 40, which has led many to conclude that he
was a late starter. In fact he was nothing of the kind.
By the time he had completed the first version of his
official ‘Symphony No. 1’ in 1866, Bruckner had already
composed three full settings of the Latin Mass, a more
than promising Requiem in D minor (1849), four Psalm
settings and a fair quantity of short liturgical pieces,
all bearing witness to his intensely felt Roman Catholic
faith. His first effort at composition was a setting of
the prayer Pange lingua (‘Sing, my tongue, the Saviour’s
glory’), written at the age of 11. Church music was in his
blood right from the start.

motets, Christus factus est follows a symphonic journey
of motivic and harmonic development, a parallel to
Christ’s earthly journey of ‘obedience unto death’ on the
cross. All suggestion of triumphalism is avoided in the
final reference to the ‘name which is above all names’.

Christus factus est pro nobis obediens
usque ad mortem, mortem autem crucis.
Propter quod et Deus exaltavit illum
et dedit illi nomen,
quod est super omne nomen.
Christ became obedient for us,
even unto death, death upon the cross.
Because of this, God raised him
and bestowed on him the name
which is above all names.

The motet Christus factus est appeared in 1884 – the
same year as the much grander Te Deum, which it
echoes in its hushed final bars (at the words ‘quod est
super omne nomen’). It is remarkably exploratory in
style and expression, with some extraordinary harmonic
twists following the words ‘mortem autem crucis’
(‘death on the cross’). More than any of Bruckner’s great

London Philharmonic Orchestra | 9

PROGRAMME NOTES

Anton Bruckner
Symphony No. 9 in D minor (1951 Nowak edition)
1 Feierlich [Solemn], Misterioso
2 Scherzo: Bewegt, lebhaft [With movement, lively] – Trio: Schnell [Fast] – Scherzo
3 Adagio: Langsam, feierlich [Slow, solemn]
Bruckner started work on his Ninth Symphony in August
1887. He was still working on it on the day he died, nine
years later. It’s not hard to find reasons why. Bruckner’s
physical health was declining, and along with it
his mental stability. As his anxiety about the Ninth
increased, so did the strange obsessive behaviour that
had so worried friends in the past. And he would keep
finding distractions: major revisions of four symphonies
and two of his Masses; plus the composition of two big
choral works: Psalm 150 and the cantata Helgoland.
Perhaps the main problem was that Bruckner had
raised the bar particularly high for his Ninth Symphony.
It was to be nothing less than a summing up of his life's
achievement, with an added element of tribute to one
of his musical idols: 'I'll write my last symphony in
D minor, just like Beethoven's Ninth’, Bruckner told
his students at the Vienna University. ‘Beethoven
won't object.' Above all, the devoutly Roman Catholic
Bruckner intended to dedicate his Ninth Symphony
'dem lieben Gott' ('to dear God'). At the same time, there
are hints that Bruckner’s confidence in his ‘dear God’
was wavering. His doctor, Richard Heller, felt sure that
Bruckner 'had drawn up a contract’ with the Almighty.
‘If He willed that the Symphony … should be finished,
He should give Bruckner the time he needed for his task;
if he died too soon and his musical offering was left
incomplete, God had only himself to blame.'
It was to be a very close-run thing. When Bruckner died
on 11 October 1896, he was almost certainly working
on the last pages of the sketch-score. If so, where they
ended up is anyone's guess. Dr Heller remembered
Bruckner playing the end of the symphony on the piano.
Bruckner's biographer Max Auer also claimed that he
saw a page of the sketch score, at or near the end of the
finale. Alas, this crucial page has also vanished.

10 | London Philharmonic Orchestra

Fortunately for us, the three movements Bruckner
did complete in full orchestral score comprise a
satisfying musical experience in their own right.
In fact the structure they present – two long, slowpaced movements framing a compact, faster Scherzo
with central trio – is remarkably well balanced. The
Adagio’s terrifying dissonance is surely a long way from
the triumphant ‘hymn of praise’ Bruckner intended
as the culmination of his last symphony. Yet the
movement’s quietly resigned coda, with its fleeting
tender references to some of his most successful earlier
works, can be experienced as a kind of answer to the
dark probing of the first movement and the nightmare
visions of the Scherzo.
The first movement's structure may initially seem
baffling. In marked contrast to the concentrated,
economical first movement of the Eighth Symphony,
there is a profusion of themes here, with many sudden
changes in tempo and direction. At times the very tonal
foundations of this ‘cathedral in sound’ seem to shake
under our feet, and yet Bruckner draws everything
together in the movement’s awe-inspiring final
crescendo.
Formally the central Scherzo is clarity itself. This is a big
A–B–A structure, with a weirdly animated central trio
section. This Scherzo’s pounding repetitive rhythms and
harsh dissonances have invited comparison with Bartók,
Prokofiev or Shostakovich. But the central trio section
inhabits a very different world: feverish, disturbingly
sensual, this too seems to peer half-nervously, half
excitedly into the 20th century.
The Adagio begins with more restless searching,
initiated by an anguished violin motif, leaping upward
just over an octave then plunging back downward.
In the impassioned spiritual journey that follows, there

are moments of radiance amid tormented crescendos
and long wintry melodies. But the final buildup contains
the most agonizing music in the whole symphony,
with trombones, tuba and the other bass instruments
bellowing out the Adagio's opening violin theme, now
stretched even wider. The culminating discord is left

hanging in the air, unresolved. Somehow the coda
manages to bring a sense of peace and long-sought
stability. Bruckner never intended this to be the ending
of his last Symphony, but it is hard to imagine a more
moving farewell.

Texts and translations begin on the next page.
For Bruckner, the Te Deum was ‘the pride of my life’.
In a letter to the conductor Hermann Levi, written eight
days after the work’s triumphant Viennese première
in 1885, Bruckner wrote of ‘the Te Deum for choir and
orchestra, which I dedicated to God for having brought
me through so much anguish in Vienna’. Bruckner had
needed all the reserves of strength his Roman Catholic
faith could bring him during his first decade and a half
in the Austrian capital, where his music had encountered
incomprehension, and even savage mockery.
It wasn’t until 1881 that Bruckner’s fortunes underwent
a reversal, when the Fourth Symphony had its first
performance under Hans Richter. It was a success –
Bruckner’s first since he moved to Vienna. Significantly,
the first surviving sketches for the Te Deum date from
that same year. The Te Deum is one of Bruckner’s most
grandly affirmative works: exactly the kind of offering
one might expect from a grateful survivor. When
Bruckner realised he might not live to finish the last
movement of the Ninth Symphony, he recommended
using the Te Deum as an alternative finale. This has never
caught on in concert (the Ninth is usually performed in
its incomplete, three-movement form), but it attests to
Bruckner’s enduring pride in this work.

As to the text itself, the old church hymn ‘Te Deum’
is one of the most joyous affirmations of faith in the
Christian liturgy. According to legend, it was improvised
by Saints Augustine and Ambrose at the former’s
baptism in ad387. Almost certainly Bruckner would
have heard this story as a boy, while he was a chorister
and scholar at the Augustinian monastery of St Florian.
Bruckner honours another of his musical gods in the
opening bars of the Te Deum. The opening chantlike phrase for the choir is very similar to that which
begins Haydn’s splendid ‘Marie Therese’ Te Deum of
1800. But the effect is very different: where Haydn’s
setting bounds forwards, Bruckner presents us with an
awe-inspiring slab of sound. For some time afterwards,
Bruckner alternates massive tutti passages like this
with quieter, more reflective music. At the heart of
the work are two intensely devotional sections led by
the tenor solo (at the words ‘Te ergo quaesumus’ and
‘Salvum fac populum tuum’). In both passages, a solo
violin adds an exquisite counterpoint in rising scales,
underlining echoes in the text of the Catholic Mass
– specifically the point in the liturgy where the priest
blesses the bread and the wine.

We praise Thee, O God:
we acknowledge Thee to be the Lord.
All the earth doth worship Thee,
the Father everlasting.
To thee all Angels cry aloud:
the Heavens and all the Powers therein.
To Thee Cherubim and Seraphim
continually do cry,
Holy, Holy, Holy:
Lord God of Sabaoth;
Heaven and earth are full of the Majesty
of Thy glory.
The glorious company of the Apostles praise Thee.
The goodly fellowship of the Prophets praise Thee.
The noble army of Martyrs praise Thee.
The holy Church throughout all the world
doth acknowledge Thee;
The Father of an infinite Majesty;
Thine honourable, true, and only Son;
Also the Holy Ghost: the Comforter.
Thou art the King of Glory, O Christ.
Thou art the everlasting Son of the Father.
When Thou tookest upon Thee to deliver man:
Thou didst not abhor the Virgin’s womb.
When Thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death,
Thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers.
Thou sittest at the right hand of God
in the glory of the Father.
We believe that Thou shalt come to be our Judge.

O Lord, save Thy people,
and bless Thine heritage.
Govern them and lift them up for ever.
Day by day we magnify Thee;
And we worship Thy Name, ever world without end.
Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin.
O Lord, have mercy upon us, have mercy upon us.
O Lord, let Thy mercy lighten upon us:
as our trust is in thee.

The London
Philharmonic Trust
Victoria Sharp Chair
Desmond Cecil CMG
Jonathan Harris CBE FRICS
Dr Catherine C. Høgel
Martin Höhmann
Angela Kessler
Clive Marks OBE FCA
Julian Simmonds
Timothy Walker AM†
Laurence Watt
American Friends of the
London Philharmonic
Orchestra, Inc.
We are very grateful to the
Board of the American Friends
of the London Philharmonic
Orchestra for its support of
the Orchestra’s activities in
the USA.